Resolution: Redux
by xerenles
Summary: A retelling of Mass Effect 3. There will be spoilers! T for now, but language and other happenings may eventually bump it up to M.
1. Prologue

Something was up. For hours, the footfalls outside her room had been more hurried than usual, urgent. She wrinkled her brow and took a swallow from the now tepid coffee she held, giving the door a hard stare. No use for it, if she was needed, they'd escort her out to whatever was going on. As it was, she was being left out of the loop and had been for the last six months. Everything she did was monitored, even her time on the extranet was limited to checking emails once a week though she had only received mails from her mother and, on occasion, her father.

She resisted the urge to sigh and put the coffee cup down harder on the table than she had meant, it made a loud clack as it sloshed some its contents over the brim. She brushed the nonexistent spray off of her and straightened the blouse of her uniform. Initially, she had gone back to wearing the uniform to serve as a reminder to the defense committee and whoever else of who she was - _is. _Now she felt that its only function was to remind herself alone. She felt along the collar, her fingers brushing against the bars that she had refused to remove. She was sure that someone had something to say about it but what were they going to do? Demote her again?

Thinking about her demotion sent a nervous chill through her. She had served in the Alliance for fourteen years and had driven herself to build an impressive career. She had doggedly followed the "hearts and minds" doctrine when dealing with alien races, going against her personal wishes on several missions as a result. Risked her life over and over again on missions to cover Alliance fuck ups and silence its annoyances. Had done everything in her power to make sure that she was seen as some sort of paragon, that humanity was an ally the Council wanted to have by her example. Was this how it ended - under house arrest, paraded in front of human dignitaries, her warnings to them and the defense committee ignored as they sat smugly on their asses?

She turned herself in because she thought that she could make a difference if she returned to an Alliance post. That even if she advised them in some sort of unofficial role, that at least humanity would be prepared when the Reapers came. Yet here she stood, locked in a room and she'd be genuinely surprised if she found that any of her advice on weaponry or fortifications had been taken to heart. How much time had she bought them with Bahak? A few months? A year? Maybe two? Shepard flexed her jaw, the muscles on her face loosening, grinding her teeth would only add to her headache.

A flicker of motion outside caught her eye. The boy had come out to play. She smiled as she watched him hold a toy ship in the air weaving around the yard. She could make out "Normandy" printed on the side of it. Bionic eyes, too? _Christ. _The implant toward the back of her skull buzzed uncomfortably and she rubbed her forehead wearily.

She had resisted getting an implant when her powers began to manifest, though her parents made her receive training on how to control it, they had enough clout to make sure that she was not entered into the biotic database. When she had enlisted, she signed on to become a regular groundpounder, later entering an infiltrator school - had it been known, her wants would have been ignored and she would have been sent straight to a training camp. Biotics in her units could tell she held some inclination, but most assumed that her powers were latent. Thanks to Lawson and the L5 she installed, Shepard lit up like a beacon on meters and could no longer pass off her abilities as something of no consequence. She wondered what that meant for her now. _This is not exactly how I was, Cerberus._

It would be such an easy thing to charge out of the room to where the boy played. She felt herself pulse as she focused on a spot in the yard, the release was always a heady thing for her, almost euphoric. _So easy_. Since her acquittal of destroying the Bahak System - inconclusive evidence - she could claim Spectre privilege and no one would -

She quickly released the energy as she heard James stop in front of the door. His gait had a heavier sound than most. Even if it were not the case, he was the only one that ever entered her room. She wondered why Anderson chose him to guard her. She knew that Vega was sympathetic to her and wouldn't get in her way if she chose to leave. Hell, he'd probably _help_ her if she demanded it. Anderson had to have known, would have known she would instantly pick up on it. Was he offering her a way out if she chose to take it? Did he know she wouldn't?

"Commander," he drawled. She shook her head, was he even aware of any of this?

"You're not supposed to call me that, James."

"Not supposed to salute you either," he said as he snapped off a salute. "We gotta go, the defense committee wants to see you."

James was rarely this abrupt. The people walking quickly past the door didn't slow and peer in to catch a glimpse of their captive as usual. Something _was_ up, her heart thudded in her chest, _not now. _"Sounds important."

She had to quicken her pace to join Vega as people rushed past them. "What's going on?"

"Couldn't say. Just said they needed you. Now."

Shepard felt her stomach sink. Previous meetings with the committee were scheduled weeks in advance. The Alliance military never did anything on the fly unless something major was happening, the paper pushers would not be rushed with their forms otherwise. Still, it was nice to step out of her cell and go about unnoticed for the time being.

She felt the corners of her lips quirk up as she spotted Admiral Anderson striding toward them, the throng of people making sure to carefully step around him instead of jostling into him like they had with James and herself. She was happy to see him. Why was he here? Council business?

"Anderson."

"Admiral," James said, saluting.

"You look good, Shepard. Maybe a little soft around the edges. How are you holding up since being relieved of duty?"

Soft? The only thing Shepard had available to do during the past six months to relieve stress was work out. She was fairly certain her body was in better shape than it had been in years. She playfully patted her stomach. "It's not so bad once you get used to the hot food and soft beds," she answered. Truth was, it had been miserable. She couldn't recall a time where she felt as frustrated or alone as she had during her incarceration.

"We'll get it sorted out." He knew. She was grateful he didn't press it.

"What's going on?" she asked as she dodged a few more bodies. If anyone knew, Anderson did.

"Admiral Hackett's mobilizing the fleets, I guess word has reached Central Command. Something big is headed our way."

Her feet felt glued to the floor, "The Reapers?"

Anderson stopped to address her and shook his head, "We don't know, not for certain."

_You're lying_. "What else could it be?"

His eyes narrowed, "If I knew that," he trailed off.

A few years ago, her word of the Reapers was enough for him to be a believer. Since joining The Council and her involvement with Cerberus, his belief in her began to waver. Why? She had provided him regular reports when she fought against the Collectors, had given him a very detailed account on what they had found at the base, including holos of the human reaper. She had destroyed it and the base of course - no one should have that technology, not even humanity.

She read between the lines, _We'll discuss this when we get to the meeting. _ She grit her teeth, _you have to make them listen to me, goddammit. _"You know we're not ready if it is them."

"Tell that to the defense committee."

_What good would that do? _"Unless we're planning to talk the Reapers to death, this meeting is a waste of time." She had tried talking to the defense committee, her warnings of the Reaper threat and the necessary steps to bolster their defenses were dismissed. The way they spoke to her during the last meeting reminded her of her conversation with the Council the year before, _Ah yes, "Reapers"._ If it didn't mean the end of her species, she wouldn't mind leaving them under Harbinger's foot. Did it have feet? Maybe they were tentacles - it looked like a squid to her.

Anderson took a different approach, "They're just scared, none of them have seen what you've seen. You faced a Reaper. Hell, you even spoke to one, then you blew the damn thing up. You've seen how they harvest us, what they plan to do to us. You know more about this enemy than anyone."

Shepard didn't feel sympathy for them. How many years had she warned everyone about the Reapers? How many times was her advice ignored? She had met with the committee, had repeatedly petitioned for more meetings when none of the members of the board would hear her, had stayed on Earth on the off chance that she would be here if one of them did decide to hear her. They _should _ be scared, humanity was going to be up shit creek once the invasion began because they refused to do anything. The colonists in those vats, awake and screaming as they were fed into tubes... she mentally shook herself and narrowed her eyes.

"Is that why they grounded me? Took away my ship?"

The Admiral stopped, annoyance radiating from him. "You know that's not true. When you blew up the Batarian Relay, hundreds of thousands of Batarians died!"

"It was that or let the Reapers walk through our back door!" _You weren't there, I had no choice!_

"I know that, Shepard," his features softened, "and so does the committee. If it wasn't for that, you would have been court martialed and thrown into the brig."

_Hackett pulled strings and those committee assholes don't know anything. _She seethed. She didn't have an "official" court martial, but being grounded, taking ships, house arrest, and being relieved of duty were just the sort of punishments that came from court martialing. _You can put lipstick on a pig... _"That and your good word?"

"Yeah, Shepard, I trust you and so does the committee."

_Bullshit. _"I'm just a soldier, Anderson, I'm no politician." _I'm done with this. If they aren't going to listen to what I have to say, I'm leaving tonight. I've wasted six months on these people._

"I don't need you to be either. I just need you to do whatever the hell it takes to help us stop the Reapers."

The doors leading into the lobby for Central Command slid open and with it, the faint smell of Kaidan's cologne. _Now's not the time to get nostalgic_, she chided herself, though it did take the edge off of her anger - he always had that effect on her. A woman with a holopad in her hand approached them, "They're expecting you two, Admiral." People seemed hurried even in here, it had to be serious. The woman led them further into the lobby.

"Good luck in there, Shepard" James said from behind her. He knew the headache she had had filling out the piles of paperwork to request meetings with the committee, he had delivered the packets himself. He also became the bearer of bad news once they decided to start blowing her off as well.

She turned and shook his hand, "Thanks, James. I'm going to need it."

"It looks like whatever this is is pretty bad, they'll have to listen to you this time."

"I hope so." She gave him a small smile. If this went south, he would help her leave, no question. Things were looking up already.

"Anderson." She froze, her hand briefly tightened its grip on James'. He gently squeezed her hand, it was a small comfort. "Shepard." _Breathe._

She turned to face him. The past two years, despite dusting his temples with grey, had been kind to him. When she had first seen herself in a mirror after waking up in the Cerberus lab, she had been dismayed to see that she looked to be in her early twenties, all of the scars and fine lines she developed that made her _her _ had been erased. Now she was confident that she wouldn't look as haggard as she felt. She had been worried that people wouldn't take her seriously after that, but people feared and respected her name, regardless of her looks. The thought made her straighten her shoulders. "Kaidan," she answered steadily.

"How'd it go in there, Major?" Anderson asked, Shepard could feel her eyes widen.

"Okay, I think. Hard to know. I'm just waiting for orders now."

She hadn't known. When did this happen? "Major?" she asked, Kaidan looked slightly embarrassed.

"You hadn't heard?" Anderson sounded surprised. He looked at the two of them, a confused frown beginning to form. The Admiral had known about her relationship with Alenko aboard the SR-1, probably assumed that she would be the first to know about his promotion. Finding out this way stung. She supposed she could understand, Alenko was a career man and she had become a pariah. _"Maybe when this is all over..." _ When did it ever end with her?

"No, I hadn't." She debated whether she should expand on this or not but let it drop. Her voice sounded foreign to her ears, a much sharper tone than she usually used. She hadn't spoken to him since Horizon, hadn't heard from him since that email he sent a couple weeks afterward.

"Sorry, Shepard, it's been, well..."

_Spare me._ "That's okay. Just," she hesitated, _You could have at least emailed me, _"glad I bumped into you, Major." She felt dismayed, it really was over. She'd revisit this when she had time later but she didn't have the time to dwell on it now. "Congratulations on the promotion, sir."

Anderson looked at Kaidan and winced. Her tone and wording was carefully impersonal, a subordinate speaking to a superior officer. _Much, much later._

Both men quickly closed their features off. "Thanks, Shepard. It was good to see you, too."

"Admiral," the woman from the front lobby called.

"Come on."

Her legs felt mechanical, her back ramrod straight as she followed behind Admiral Anderson. From the corner of her eye, she could see Kaidan, _no, _Major Alenko give her a small smile and a nod. She couldn't bring herself to look at him directly. _Focus on the meeting._

As she entered the chamber, chatter between the board members ceased. People that were intently studying holopads looked up, those facing away from the door slowly turned around to face where she and her mentor stood. _God, what colony has been lost?_

"Admiral Anderson, Shepard," a balding man addressed them from a long table in the center of the room, the holoscreens in front flickering off.

"What's the situation?" she asked. This was her in her natural environment. A soldier approached her and handed her a pad. _When everything goes to shit, call Commander Shepard._

"We were hoping you would tell us." _With what information, idiot?_

"There are reports coming in are unlike anything we've ever seen," the woman with greying hair to the man's left answered. "Whole colonies have gone dark. We've lost contact with everything beyond the Sol Relay."

"Whatever this is, it's incomprehensibly powerful," the man finished.

_They're here, _anger surged through her, _why didn't any of you do something?_ She finished scanning over the report she was handed and fixed the ineffectual group with a glare, "You've brought me here to confirm what you already know, the Reapers are here." The room shifted nervously, _still want to tell me those are _just _Geth ships?_

"Then, how do we stop them?" the woman asked.

Now they asked, now they were ready to listen, but it was too late. It had taken her months to bolster the SR-2's defenses and weaponry to withstand the Collector base. These people had the power to do the same to many ships in a fraction of the time she had needed. Time had run out, they likely only had hours at most if they were lucky. She remembered feeling amazed at how fast Sovereign could fly on Eden Prime, _very lucky_, she amended. "Stop them?" she repeated, almost mockingly. "This isn't about strategy or tactics, this is about survival!" Shepard knew that a few members in the room would still be resistant and find her speech melodramatic but she had to get the ones who were now listening to understand. The Reapers weren't coming to fight a war, they were coming to annihilate sentient life. They were an enemy whose very proximity would turn people into their puppets. Leaders would command their followers not to fight against the Reapers, the media would purposefully misinform to sabotage defense efforts, willing sacrifices, running to their deaths with open arms... she began to walk toward the table, her tone taking on staccato-like quality to drive home her message. "The Reapers are more advanced than we are, more powerful, more intelligent. They don't fear us and they'll _never _take pity on us." She stopped in front of them, carefully schooling her face to stare down the defense committee belligerently. They were bending, _hear me._

"But," the woman gasped, "there must be some way."

Her emotions swung from disgust to pity. "If we're going to have any chance of surviving this, we're going to have to stand together."

"_That's _ it?" the bald man asked incredulously, "_That's _our plan?!" Shepard's hands balled into fists, she willed herself to relax, now was not the time to lose her temper. If she shook him by his collar and called him a dumbass for not making any preparations, the meeting would dissolve into a finger pointing fest. She hoped she would be able to in the future, but today was not the day. _With the other races, stupid!_

"Admiral! We've lost contact with the Lunar base!" a voice interrupted.

"The Moon? They couldn't be that close already," Anderson sounded shocked, _I am sorry, old friend._

"How did they get past our defenses?"

Shepard knew, but stayed silent. Sorrow washed over her, two years lost on that operating table. She would never have allowed The Council to cover up what happened during the Battle of the Citadel, would have pressured the Alliance into preparing for the inevitable invasion. She should have taken some time off, let someone else clear the Geth pockets and regrouped. Would she still had died if she had? Would Kaidan be just "Major Alenko" or would he be standing beside her, quietly supporting her as she tried to explain just how serious the Reapers were? Resignation settled in as she watched the panic flicker across the faces of people furiously waving between screens. _They've arrived_, she felt as if she had aged one hundred years in an instant.

"Sir, UK Headquarters has a visual." A screen behind them came on, the feed showed a lot of interference, the picture had a lot of static and the sound came distorted but it was clear enough. London burned as a soldier stood in rubble, screaming something that she couldn't quite make out, though the look of fear on the man's face was easy to see. A Reaper screamed in the distance. The rubble behind the soldier exploded, flinging his body toward the screen before the signal was lost. The room became silent save for the holoscreen that was now displaying feeds from around the world, each displaying at least one Reaper in each city, reducing the buildings to rubble.

"Why haven't we heard from Admiral Hackett?" Anderson asked, worriedly.

"What do we do?"

Shepard looked down, _there's nothing left to do, this is it._ She took a breath, looked at the frame on the screen and collected herself. "The only thing we can," she said pointing behind her, "we fight or we die." The committee looked at each other in horror. She couldn't blame them, it was a terrible thing to suddenly have your sense of security yanked away. She had felt it when she fought the human reaper in the Collector's base.

"We should get to the Normandy," Anderson said quietly. _I should never have left it._ The building rumbled ominously and everyone turned to the large windows overlooking Vancouver. Her eyes narrowed, she knew that sound, where was it? The clouds in the distance began to flash red as it descended, Shepard could feel the adrenaline coursing through her.

"Oh my god," someone said as it started firing on buildings, it was turning in their direction.

_Get away from the windows, _her mind screamed. "MOVE!" she yelled, sprinting toward the doorway, looking for any sort of cover. "Go, go, go!" The glass shattered behind her and the concussion from the blast knocked her forward. Luckily, it knocked the table where the heads of the committee had been sitting moments ago above her. She rolled into her fall, scrambling to regain her footing. She turned and faced the window, the Reaper was charging another shot, _shit_. It was so damn quick that she only managed to stand up before being propelled against the wall, her body painfully slamming into something hard with sharp angles. Dazed, Shepard tried to remember if there were benches lining the wall to try to stay conscious. _I'm so tired of all of this,_ she thought as the the world turned black.

**AN: **This, for those of you who just scrolled down, is a retelling of ME3. Spoilers abounds! I don't plan on following the game dialogue as closely as I did in this chapter but I do want to keep it fairly similar. For those of you that can't get into a story unless the Shepard is similar to yours, this one is Spacer/War Hero/Alenko/Paragon-slight Paragrade. Kind of torn on the jobs at the moment, but will probably opt for infiltrator. I am also making an effort not to describe Shepard's physical features (hair,skin, eye color). Maybe hints of Vega... not too sure about that. Citadel crushed my headcanon to bits, boohoo. Not terribly thrilled with the title either, but this will do for now. Reviews appreciated. Writing action/fight sequences is not my strong suit, if you have any suggestions, let me know!


	2. Leaving Earth

She came to the muffled sounds of gunfire. Her body ached, her head felt as if it had been split open. Shepard groaned as her hand moved to cradle her head. "Shepard!" came a voice in the distance. _I'm back on the Cerberus base, _she thought numbly. Was this a dream? This time she'd let someone else wake up to fight for Miranda, the Akuze survivor or the Butcher of Torfan would be excellent choices in her opinion. _I'm probably called the Butcher of Bahak now._ Why? _Duty. _Her brows knitted together as the answer eluded her, should that mean something to her?

"Shepard!" came the voice again, it sounded masculine, familiar. _Not Miranda._ _Anderson. _The fog in her mind began to lift, the gunfire growing louder with it, _Earth! _She slowly sat up. "Shepard!" Admiral Anderson yelled again, sprinting toward her and grabbing her arm, "Come on, get up," he said as he pulled her to her feet. "Here, take this."

She stared at the pistol in confusion, she didn't remember seeing him armed. She took the gun he had thrust at her, the daze leaving her at last. _Focus, look for survivors_.

"This is Admiral Anderson, report in anyone. Major Alenko, is that you?" She felt relieved as she turned over another body, this one was breathing but barely, the breaths were shallow and the eyes already had a glassy look to them. They wouldn't live much longer. _Kaidan's alive. _"What's your status?" She stood behind Anderson, the room laid in ruins; a whole section of wall had been blown away, the bodies that lay haphazardly among the rubble were still. How many people had died already? She lost 2,400 fighting Sovereign in the Citadel, not including civilian casualties - how many more would she lose against the entire Reaper fleet? "I can't reach the Normandy," he continued, "You'll have to contact them. We'll meet you at the landing zone. Anderson out."

The Reaper that had landed was making short work out of a group of skyscrapers, its lasers obliterating anything in its path. She and the Admiral regarded each other quietly, what was there left to say? The wind howled in her ears as they both jumped onto the platform outside the window, guns drawn.

"Come on Shepard, Kaidan's headed to the Normandy. They'll pick us up if we can get to the spaceport, let's move." Her heart beat loudly in her ears, they wouldn't be able to withstand something like this for long. How had the Protheans managed? Would humanity have its own Ilos? She lowered her weapon and ran after Anderson. In the distance she could see three other Reapers had landed. "Look out!" he yelled as a red beam of light cleaved the steel in front of them in two. "How do you stop something so powerful?" _Obscene amounts of ammunition_, her mind supplied unhelpfully. She wished she knew, Sovereign could have been considered tiny compared to the one off to her right.

The building shook as they jumped over the gap that the machine created. Anderson paused and looked around, "We'll have to go this way," he said as he started toward a ladder going up, the path they had meant to take sheared off, crumbled on the ground. A jet of some sort whizzed by with several drones following close behind, the roar of its engines made her body vibrate. "Major, you read me? I'm patching in Shepard."

Kaidan's voice came in, strained with the sounds of a firefight in the background, "We're almost to the Normandy. I've got Lieutenant Vega with me but we're taking heavy fire." The link dropped, it was better that he concentrate on the fight rather than talk to them over the comm.

"Husks!" Anderson warned.

Shepard quickly adjusted the settings of the pistol, her fingers flying over the interface to enter in a code that would charge the ammunition as incendiary rounds. Her first shot went wide. _They should have let me visit the range more than once a month._ The next shot connected, the husk screeched as it tried to put out the flames spreading from its back, sending it hurtling down the side of the building.

"I'm out of ammo!" he yelled as she shot the last one climbing up.

Her omni-tool beeped. _Shit._ "I'm out, too!"

"We'll have to do this the old fashioned way."

_I am _not_ touching those things, _she thought as she quickly typed a code into the device strapped to her wrist. "Incinerate round deployed!" she shouted as the Admiral ducked down for cover. A small disk flew from it, the husks were ignited by fire and were blown off the balcony. She leaped over the railing onto the platform to make sure the area was clear and heard the tone of a Reaper firing a little too late. _Oh shit_, her eyes wide as she attempted to slide back under the railing, her arm caught the glass shrapnel where her head had been moments before.

She sprinted inside the building, she hoped she would find a medkit of some sort. _Paydirt! _Shepard ripped open a tube of medigel she found laying on the ground. It wouldn't take the glass out of her skin but it would numb the area just enough so she could use the arm.

"We've gotta find a way out of here,"Anderson called after her.

A husk tried to pry open the door as she entered the next room, its bony arms swiping at the air to reach her. She jerked her arm down in a motion that brought out her omni-blade. The fork-tipped blade arced ominously as she drove it into the creature's skull. "Through this way," she answered, stepping over the husk's body to push the doors open enough for Anderson to squeeze through. _Thump_. She looked back into the room. _Thump_, _thump. _Whatever it was was inside the ventilation shaft. Shepard let go of the the doors to investigate the noise. A boy peered at her from the whole in the wall, "Hey." she called quietly. The boy backed further into the shaft as she approached, "It's okay," she coaxed.

"Everyone's dying!" he cried, his face caked with dirt aside from the tear tracks that ran down the sides. He gasped as the ground rumbled again, retreating.

"Come here, I need to take you someplace safe." She held out her arm to him, "Take my hand." He'd die if she left him here, but where could she take him? It wasn't safe with her.

The boy shook his head, "You can't help me," he said stubbornly. She debated the merits of pulling the boy out with biotics but she wasn't an easy touch, she might very well kill him if she did.

"Shepard!" Anderson called from the next room, she turned to face the sound. When she looked back into the vent, the boy was gone. _Good luck, kid._

She walked in to find the man picking through debris, exposing a catwalk that led out of the building. "This is a goddamned mess," he complained, flinging a short beam over the walkway. "Every minute those machines are here, thousands of innocent people die. I won't be responsible for it."

_Will I be? _"It's hard enough fighting a war, but it's worse knowing that no matter how hard you try, you can't save them all."

Anderson stepped carefully around some of the larger pieces of debris. "They hit so fast... I thought we had more time."

She followed behind him. He had defended her to the Council, and probably also to the committee. She hadn't been fair. If anyone understood her frustration about warnings going ignored, it was the Admiral. "We knew they were coming," she answered simply.

"And they still just cut through our defenses!" _I told them those defenses were only good against a conventional enemy, it never sunk in. _"We need to get to the Citadel, talk to the Council."

"The Citadel?" she asked. Speaking to the Council during a time of crisis was always a lesson in futility. The Council would do nothing to help humanity if they could help themselves first. She had saved them and when she asked for help with the Terminus colonies she had been sent away. Her Spectre status had been upheld but in name only, they would not help the colonists at all. She would not go there to kiss pompous alien asses when she should be fighting here. "The fight's here."

"It'll be everywhere soon enough. You said it yourself, the Reapers will destroy everything if we don't stop them. The Council has to help us."

_No, they don't._ "Are you sure about that?"

"No, but you're a Council Spectre, that has to count for something."

"You're a Counselor, that has to hold more weight than me being a Spectre"

"I'm not a Council member anymore, Shepard."

_First Alenko and now this?_ "Who took your place?" She didn't need to ask but she held hope that he would not name the Ambassador.

"Udina." _Fuck._

"Anderson, I know you never wanted to be a politician, that's _why _I nominated you. With the Reapers coming, we needed someone that they would respect. Udina might be the choice among human politicians but the Asari, Salarian, and Turian Counselors all come from military backgrounds, they might humor him from time to time but they wouldn't respect him. Any sort of military cooperation that he would try to broker would be ignored. I made the right choice in choosing you, Udina won't be able to get anything done."

He studied the woman beside him a moment, "I just couldn't stay there, it didn't feel like I was making a difference. I felt that I could do more good out here, fighting."

She understood, but she knew that his departure was a mistake. She wouldn't say any more on it, Udina wouldn't return the seat even if she explained the situation to him. She stumbled and teetered over the edge, Anderson steadied her. "Thanks, I owe you one."

"More than one," he answered. The walkway ended in a blown out room, someone had been fighting here recently, spent clips littered the ground. "See if you can find some ammo," he urged.

She was already on it, she loaded a partial clip into her pistol and pocketed another. If she had time, she would have gone through and loaded at least one to full capacity. As it was, she felt it was a bit like playing roulette, unsure of how many rounds lie in each one. They charged down the platform leading outside the building, she wondered how close they were now.

"Major Alenko, we're in sight of the spaceport. ETA three minutes."

"We made it to the Normandy. We're taking heavy fire. Oh god." The hair on Shepard's arms rose. "We gotta take down the dreadnaught, evasive maneuvers!" He ordered, the comm line briefly left open before going silent.

"Major? Kaidan! Dammit, they're in trouble."

Shepard could see a ship flying around one of the smaller reapers, but its size still dwarfed what she assumed was the Normandy. An explosion, she shielded her eyes from the bright light, the concussion wave of the attack flinging her back and dropping the floor from under her. She desperately tried to grab anything to slow her fall, one of her fingers latched onto a grate. Pain lanced up her arm, she didn't need to hear it break to know it had broken. She curled into herself a little from the shock of it and her slide turned into a tumble. Everything spun as she hit the ground hard, the older man running past her.

"Normandy we're going to reroute. Do you copy?" The reply was scrambled. "Normandy, come in!" He crouched down and looked over their cover, "Friendlies," he announced.

Shepard jumped down to where the two sat, one man looked to be pinned and the other was scanning him with an omni-tool. "You two alright?" she asked as she walked over.

The man with the omni-tool hissed, "Get down, they'll see you!"

She looked up to see several cannibals standing on a ledge. Charging forward, she drew her pistol and began to fire, catching two of the four in the head. The next took several shots before it went down and the last fell into the water on its own.

"Shepard, over here!" Anderson ordered. "What happened here?"

Omni-tool guy answered again, his buddy appeared to be in shock. "Our gunship got shot down, we barely made it."

"You got a radio? We're trying to contact our ship."

"No," he shook his head, "there's one in the gunship but it's going to be crawling with those things.

"Stay here, son, we'll get you out of this." He and Shepard lifted the scaffolding up enough to free the man. His voice came out in a hoarse shout as he was dragged from underneath the metal bars.

Cannibals swarmed from the gunship, some chewed on the bodies that Shepard had already felled. _That can't be good._

"What the hell are those things?" Anderson asked, ducking down beside her. She wasn't sure, they looked a little like the scions she had first seen on Horizon but they didn't have the blue humpbacks. They also didn't throw shockwaves, which was a plus.

"Beats me," she answered before taking out one that had a severed arm hanging out of its mouth. The two of them pushed toward the gunship, slowly finishing off the few that had stayed on board. Shepard bent down to pick up a rifle that had been left behind, tucking the pistol into her waistband, cautiously scanning the area around them while Anderson adjusted the settings on the radio.

"Normandy, this is Anderson, do you read?"

Kaidan's voice came through clearly, "Admiral, what's your location?"

"By a downed gunship in the Harbor. I'm activating it's distress beacon." She drew a bead on a drone that sped past, they had gone unnoticed so far. "Send support, we've got wounded out here." Kaidan's response was scrambled.

_I know your tricks, motherfuckers. Where are you?_ Shepard faced toward where they entered, they were too open here. They were going to have to leave the radio, the reaper forces were drawn to them.

"Major?" The link stuttered. "Dammit! I've lost the signal," Anderson said as he stood.

"Let's hope that beacon does its job," she replied. _Because I don't think we'll be able to use our radios after this._

"And fast, we've got company!" A pod sailed over their heads and crashed in front of them. Cannibals spilled out en masse, _They've found us, _she thought as she brought the butt of the rifle against her shoulder. _We're sitting ducks out here! _Bullets tore through the first couple of monsters, but didn't set their bodies on fire. Shepard dove back undercover, adjusting the settings on the automatic rifle. _Rookie mistake,_ she berated herself before popping off a few more rounds. "Hope they get here soon," Anderson said between shots.

"You and me both!" she panted before sprinting to another position to get a better shot at the gigantic husks. She took down another two cannibals before her omni-tool beeped. Shepard threw down the rifle and pulled out the pistol, firing maybe seven bullets before its clip was spent, too. "You got any ammo?" she yelled behind her.

"Negative!"

She punched a code into her omni-tool, she couldn't rely on it entirely because it would take too long to recharge. "Incinerate, out!" It took out another three, _where are they?_ Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, she reasoned with herself. _You don't know when they're going to arrive. You either use your biotics and live or potentially get overwhelmed and die because you don't want anyone to know. _She stood, took a step forward and flared.

"Shepard?"

She could see the points where each wave would hit, could throw wave after wave while walking forward to knock them off into the Harbor - it would buy them some time. She hoped they couldn't swim. The pressure built within her as she focused where the impact would do the most damage. _And, release. _Cannibals flew into the air. _Forward, release._ One bounced off a partition and landed into the water with a satisfying splash. One more ought to do it she figured as she stepped forward again and sent a final shockwave sweeping out.

Shepard felt weak as she fell back to Anderson's position. _Did I eat breakfast this morning?_ She didn't think so.

"Got something you want to tell me?" Anderson's tone was dry.

"No, sir." Her mentor shook his head and laughed.

The Normandy flew into view, "The cavalry has arrived," Joker announced over the comm.

"You're late, Joker." she deadpanned.

"Yeah, well, I'd like to see how fast you could remove a ship-sized boot under fire," he quipped.

"Let's go," she called to the Admiral as she ran toward the ship. The bay door opened as she leapt in.

Kaidan helped her up, "Welcome aboard, Shepard."

"Thanks." she said, smiling, it was good to see him alive.

"Shepard."

_We made it, Anderson._ "Come on!"

He turned to look at the support shuttle coming in, "I'm not going." She frowned, _don't do this._ "You saw those men back there, there's a million more like them and they need a leader."

"We're in this together, Anderson. If you're staying, so am I."

"This is a fight we can't win, not without help. We need every species and all their ships to even have a chance of defeating the Reapers. Talk to the Council, convince them to help us."

"What if they don't listen?" the question sounded suspiciously like a whine. _I won't leave you here to die._

"Then _make_ them listen! Now go! That's an order."

She narrowed her eyes and looked down her nose at Anderson. This bordered on childish but she was going to pull it nonetheless, "I don't take orders from you, remember?"

The Admiral reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of dog tags and tossed them to her. She caught them easily, her name and information embossed on the steel plates. She watched him sadly, _when were you going to give me these?_ "Consider yourself reinstated, Commander."

"I'll be back for you," she promised, "and I'll bring every fleet I can. Good luck."

Anderson nodded, "You, too, Shepard."

She stood beside Kaidan, quietly watching the evac shuttles loading people on board. She spotted the boy standing amongst them, largely ignored. He covered his ears and cowered as a Reaper screamed nearby. It was too close, they had to get out of there. The boy scrambled toward the shuttle and struggled to pull himself on. Why was no one helping him? _Help the boy up! _He finally managed to climb on board, his face fearful as he watched the reaper. The door slid shut, hiding him from view. The cars began to rise as the Reaper's eye glowed red. The beam of light hit the first car, ripping it apart. Shepard flinched as it turned upward and destroyed the second car the boy was on.

"_You can't help me," _his words echoed within her as she turned and closed the bay door.

**AN:** So it begins! I'm looking forward to writing Mars. Which may or may not happen this week. Finals. D: Also, I need to write a better summary. It's straight and to the point, but boring. Maybe later, maybe never.


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